Francis Ford Coppola
One of the more random items I have ever blogged about is a song called Mill Valley. It led to a video by an “obscure young director named Francis Ford Coppola, who, two years later, would direct the film that would win the Oscar for Best Movie, The Godfather.”
In 2008, I did a quiz for The Director Who Films Your Life Test, and it turned out to be Coppola. This is interesting in that I’ve only seen a handful of his films: the original Godfather in 1972 (I even remember with whom I saw it and where, in Syracuse, NY); The Conversation (1974), which I saw on television in 2006; The Outsiders (1983); and Peggy Sue Got Married (1986).
This 2020 interview was quite enlightening.
Grateful Dead
I never saw the Grateful Dead perform, although I saw a Dead-adjacent concert in 1975, which included Bill Kreutzmann and Bobby Weir.
Grateful Dead albums I enjoy include American Beauty and Working Man’s Dead. I should note that these albums are available in full on their YouTube channel; that’s no way to operate capitalism. Then there’s at least one I hate, which is on a list of the worst albums ever: Dylan and the Dead.
I’m also fond of Deadicated – A Tribute to the Grateful Dead from 1991. Mickey Hart put out Music To Be Born By, which I listen to occasionally.
Note that the KCH only selects the members of a group who are still alive at the time of the selection, so no Jerry Garcia, Pigpen, et al. Phil Lesh died in October, but he had been chosen before that.
“In the late 1960s during her sophomore year, Bonnie Raitt took a leave from Radcliffe. Her intention was to hang with blues legends Mississippi Fred McDowell, Son House, Buddy Guy and Junior Wells, who were managed by her then-boyfriend Dick Waterman, inhaling the sort of storied education that wasn’t offered at Harvard… [She] has helmed a rock, folk and blues odyssey that is as improbable as it is lengthy, 21 albums and 54 years of touring punctuated by triumphs that erupted decades apart in an industry that tends to Vitamix its young.”
I continue to buy her albums. Wikipedia: Just Like That… is the title track of her eighteenth studio album, Just Like That…, which was released on April 22, 2022, by Redwing Records. The song was written and produced by Raitt and lyrically details the story of a woman who is visited by the recipient of her son’s heart, which he received in a life-saving organ donation operation. The song won Best American Roots Song and Song of the Year at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards, with the latter award regarded as an upset over several higher-charting songs,” much to her obvious shock.
Arturo Sandoval
The presentation was on Sunday, December 8, 2024. Celebrate the 47th Honors, hosted by Queen Latifah. CBS Broadcast: Sun. Dec. 22, 2024 at 8:30/7:30c.
The Woodstock